In a Vase on Earth Day Easter Monday…

On this rainy Easter Monday it is abundantly clear that spring has arrived. It’s a busy time of year in every way for everyone I know, including me.

I have decided to take a different approach with my blog post this month and have opted to join a meme that I like to follow; In a Vase on Monday hosted by Cathy of Rambling in the Garden. I have not played this game before, but thought it would be fun to try.

This year Earth Day has coincided with the holiday Easter Monday, and with that in mind I set off this afternoon in the stormy weather, secateurs in hand, rubber boots on feet, to gather what I could find in the way of blossoms for my vase.

It is a bit early here for the garden variety of blossom and in any case the line between our “garden” and Mother Nature’s is decidedly blurry. That’s how I like it, a little bit on the wild side.

While I walked I snipped, ending up with a pretty little bouquet that featured both wild and tame flowers. The “Wilds” include creamy, pendulous, big leaf maple blossom, hot pink salmon berry flowers, round greenish-yellow buds of Oregon-grape, pinkish-purple Pacific bleeding heart, and a sprig of huckleberry for the greens.

For “Tames” I found a small branch of Bosc pear buds on the tree in the orchard, its pink inner heart about to burst open. I added a single scented magenta bloom from the magnolia tree out back. My mother gave us that flowering tree on one of her visits a number of spring-times ago. I do not know its name, the identification label was missing from the pot when we brought it home.

A little farther along I found  a nice bright pink rhododendron bud, soon to be open for the very first time. This also label-less shrub was a rescue plant saved by C. many years ago. He found it at the local Super Store where it was about to expire from dehydration and neglect. Recovering ever since, it has finally produced its first flower buds. We are elated! Shyly though, these first flowers have appeared mostly on the backside of the shrub. We don’t know why.

The rest of the “Tames” include a few tiny forget-me-nots, a couple of mini-vinca, a.k.a. periwinkle, several deep blue, grape hyacinths and a few sprigs of what we call “mother’s menace”. This is a dead-nettle-y, creeping thing with upright sprigs of small yellow snapdragon-like flowers in between its silvery green variegated leaves. If anyone knows the name of this rampant invasive that hitch-hiked here in a pot of something else, I would love to know what it is. We keep it at bay with generous lashings of the weed whacker!

Well then, that’s that! Oh, except for the vase. I arranged my spring-time bouquet simply, in a plain, glass tumbler full of cool water. All the better to see the collection of neutral toned stalks and stems, and so as not to distract from the delicate spring blossoms of my bouquet.

Happy Easter for this year and Happy Earth Day everyday, from this little corner of the planet on this springtime Monday evening.

 

 

©ClaudiaLake, 2019